


in the end you'll still be alive

by Redryne



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: 3rd P.O.V, Asexual Character, BAMF Keith, BAMF Lance, BAMF lotor, But not all the time, Don't worry, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Keith needs a hug, Lance Is Smart, Lance Needs a Hug, Langst, No Smut, Slow Updates, angst no comfort, because previous version was shit, can't you tell, first fic, i can't write, implied/referenced underaged drinking, lol, lotor's actually good, mostly everyone has long hair, not so angsty as you'd think, plot deviates, rewriting, some language
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2020-10-09 21:34:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20516774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redryne/pseuds/Redryne
Summary: EDITING, previously 'greener pastures' and before that it was known as 'darken the sorrow'The paladins don't want Lance there and he doesn't either.Even so, he has a responsibility to protect everyone that can't protect themselves- he can't just leave and go.So how's he going to cope?





	1. multi-darkness

**Author's Note:**

> rewriting! because i went through an abrupt period of having what i've already written LMAO
> 
> so some of you have probably noticed that this has the same plot as 'Darken The Sorrow' and that's because this is the rewritten version haha. I couldn't keep the p.o.v's consistent enough for me to publish chapters and the story just felt like it didn't flow to me, so I decided to just rewrite the entire plan ^^"  
this is my first fic! ^^" please be gentle! ^^"  


**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "-a prephase, what they call the realisation."

Lance wanted to be a doctor. 

He wanted to study medicine and become a doctor for as long as he could remember. It was all he ever wanted. 

Saving lives out there on the frontlines, restoring hope and sending relief where he could. It was the bit about saving people that drew the most attention. Just imagining the thought of bringing someone back from the edge of death to their waiting family was enough to keep him up for hours on end, daydreaming up endless possibilities. 

Leo wanted to be an astronaut. (How utterly foolish.) 

That was his dream from when he could talk.

He wanted to explore the world out there, map the galaxies and the stars and be the first to discover new planets, new planets. He wanted to see what it was like out there in space, where it was still and quiet and so, so dark. 

Lance didn’t like space. 

It scared him, the expanse of darkness stretching further beyond the eye could see. The possible existence of other things out there gave him the creeps, but it was Leo’s favourite thing to talk about. Just like how Lance couldn’t shut up about medicine, Leo couldn’t shut up about space.

Leo liked the idea of aliens. 

Tall, short, green, whatever colour, size or shape, you name it. He was utterly fascinated, even more so when it was announced that the Kerboros mission was set to take off in several years time. 

In their little family, it wasn’t an issue that there was no _Pa, _that none of them could remember a Papá. They were happy with their expanding family, despite the money struggles Ma always tried to hide from them. Sure, sometimes her smile slipped a little and the crow-feet in her temples deepened and they didn’t have much to eat at times, but their older siblings picked out some odd jobs here and there and the road was relatively smooth again. 

Lance and Leo made a vow to pick up temporary jobs over the summer holidays and surprise Ma with a gift. 

So innocent, so naive. (Good times never last long. Shouldn’t you know that by now?)

Papá showed up when the twins were seven. He was kind at first. He brought them all little gifts. Lance and Leo had to share a carved toy plane because he didn’t know they were twins. Their siblings didn’t know how to treat him. Leo seemed to like him. Marco sneered whenever he tried to draw everyone into a conversation. Their other siblings seemed to dislike him, but kept polite because Ma seemed to smile a lot more. 

A month later, Papá got drunk and it turned into a horror story straight out of the grainy shows they’d watch on the old television in their neighbours house. 

It became a common thing. He threw bottles and smashed whatever he got his hands on. He was violent. Ma was shaky. ‘_Give it some time, he’ll be alright,_’ she said, but it looked like she was trying to reassure herself. 

He lost control some nights. He hit Ma, and she was too frightened to fight back. Those nights, one of their older siblings- Luis mostly- hurried Lance and Leo to their room and told them to lock the door with a tense smile. They heard things being smashed, Ma being called horrible names. (“Shut up _perra_! What do you know, you-“) 

When they came out the next morning, there would bruises on their older brother’s faces. Papá barely made appearances and there’d always be a heavy silence that lingered in the old house like a invisible, heavy weight. 

Looking back on it, he’s not sure how they managed to live like that for so long. It affected all of them, but nobody ever said anything because it was taboo. 

One night, Luis couldn’t bring them back to their room in time and Papá, drunkenly waving around a sharp piece of bottle glass, sliced it across Lance’s back. Time might have held still, in the few seconds that nothing registered. The splintering pain hit him like a train-wreck. He can’t remember who screamed. 

He needed so many stitches. He’s got a scar now- an ugly thing stretching from the edge of his left shoulder-blade down to his waist, almost at his right hip. It grew with him, but the memory would never fade like the scar did. 

His injury was the last straw. He heard later- while resting in hospital with Leo sitting teary-eyed beside him- that Marco had forcibly thrown Pa— that man out and told him to never show his face around there again. 

He’s got a scar now- an ugly thing stretching from the edge of his left shoulder-blade down to his waist, almost at his right hip. It grew with him, but the memory would never fade like the scar did.

That was when they were nine. 

He put it behind himself. He’s pretty sure all his siblings did too. He thought things would get better, but things always get worse before they can get better. 

A year later Leo died. 

_A freak accident_, they called it. (Was it an accident, really?) 

An out of control car smashed into the one in front and spun off the road. The driver never saw the small child crossing the street, too busying trying to wrestle the car into control. The child at least, hadn’t seen death approach at the speed of light, his eyes on his twin waiting for him on the other side of the road. 

Leo was dead before his body even bounced off the asphalt. At least he hadn’t felt it. 

Lance had seen it all. 

He was the one waiting on the other side of the road, the one who saw the Leo’s limbs all bend back and sideways at sickening angles, the one who saw the light leave his brothers eyes faster then a flock of vultures descending upon a body. 

“Poor Lance,” they whispered later, but he heard it no matter how quietly they spoke. “His twin is dead.” (“Will he grow up twisted? Will he be mental? Will he-”) 

So that was that. 

His little medical fantasies drowned themselves really quickly. The same part of him that missed his brother forced himself to look at space with the same, unbridled joy Leo had. 

When he moved to a new school, he introduced himself as Lance and didn’t mention Leo. It didn’t matter that he felt a burn in his chest when he couldn’t wake up Leo so they could go to school together like they’d always had. It didn’t matter that he was miserable under his little happy facade. (Of course it doesn’t matter.) 

Never mind that Ma, under the stress of all these things, was now bedridden, or that he threw himself into his studies in a frankly unhealthy way to forget that Leo ever existed. 

Lance joined the Garrison at 15. 

He renamed _Tsuyoshi_ as Hunk and messed around with Pidge, who he was fairly certain wasn’t a male. He changed the topic as sneakily as he could whenever family was brought up. He acted dumb and messed up flight stimulations and scored low so his little ragtag band wouldn’t get picked on like in middle school for being too smart. He practised his english and hid his confusion well at the words he didn’t know. 

He tried to befriend Keith, but the mullet guy just didn’t seem to want company. He ignored all the comparisons between him and Keith because he knew that they weren’t the same. When he realised he was just a cargo pilot, he put in a little more effort to make sure he’d become a fighter pilot- _because that was what Leo wanted- _and by extension, him. 

Then Keith got kicked out or left himself or something and he got the position automatically. It left a bad taste in his mouth, like he was just being mocked for making a conscious effort. 

Never mind that. 

Soon enough, space grew on him. He didn’t fear it as much, didn’t dislike it as much. Hearing about the stars even made him feel some interest. He forgot why he hated the expanse of empty matter and the darkness. He forgot that he wanted to be a doctor. 

Then they found the Blue Lion. Everything flooded back, broken shards of his old dreams and hopes and fears. (Here’s your dream, try and put it back together again! You can’t, can you?)

Lance was terrified, and he hid it too well. 

* * *

Silence lingers in the room, overflowing and overbearing and all the ‘over’ english words that Lance hated learning back when he was on Earth.

It isn’t more so tension then it is a stark amount of disappointment. The bleak thought comes to mind that it has a target: himself. The one and only screw-up aboard the castle-ship. 

Allura’s the one lecturing him today. 

She looks tired. Resigned. Her arms are crossed and her lips are pursed and she looks like she doesn’t want to be there, she doesn’t want to be the one sharply admonishing Lance. Not that she thinks he doesn’t deserve to be yelled at like that. (If somebody listened, or if it was somebody else in his place…) 

“Lance. You had one single thing to do.” 

Her hair’s up in a messy bun, her crown isn’t there and her armour’s looking worse for wear. Everyone’s in a similar state, some worser then others. 

“Why didn’t you follow Shiro’s instructions?” The unspoken ‘It’s your fault everyone’s injured’ hangs in the air like a bad smell- or the scent of burning bread the day Papa left. 

In the corner of his eye, he can see Keith shifting his weight. He’s looking obviously uncomfortable at the confrontation- in all the times Lance has been taught a lesson publicly, he’s the only one who’s ever appeared unwilling to heap most of the blame on the Blue one, yet has never done anything to stop it- a bystander. Even so, Lance has that small unexplainable gratefulness towards him.

He also looks deathly tired, bags heavy and too-visible under his dull violet eyes. Lance is reminded that he’ll need to wrestle Keith (not literally, because Keith would probably accidentally end up killing him if they really went at it) to bed later. 

“How many times do we have to tell you not to mess things up?” 

So straight to the point, as she's always been.

He makes the mistake of glancing to the left to find something else to stare at- Pidge meets his gaze unflinchingly from where she’s lounging on the couch. Hostile and dismissive. He gets that she's rather stressed abut their family, and she might have been able to gain some new information if not for his intervention in the fight- but does she really have to be so openly biased? 

Her eye-bags are worser then Keith’s, and that’s saying something. It doesn’t matter if Pidge hates him, he’s still got the job of persuading her to go to bed. It’s alright if they want to replace him. He can bear that. His own health isn’t of the upmost importance.

The pilots of the lions should be well-rested to take on the Galra- he’ll get all of them to sleep with whatever tricks he has left up his sleeves. So what if they forget that he’s probably the reason why they’re able to stand up and fight? In the end, it matters more that it’s his fault they lose the fight. 

Hunk is leaning against the wall with a tiredness Lance knows they all feel. Today’s battle was disastrous- more so then usual, and he’s pretty sure Hunk needs more time in one of the pods. 

There isn’t even a flicker of support in those dark eyes, (where _did_ his old friend go) but he’ll be alright. 

Shiro's propped himself up against the door frame with his arms crossed, angry creases in his brows. Not too strange, that the idol he’d looked up to back at the Garrison doesn’t quite like him. He’s too lame, too stupid, too loud and uncaring for a guy who’d been through alien hell and back. 

Obviously, there were better things that the Black Paladin could be doing right now.

“You’re the Blue Paladin Lance.” _Not the princess,_ she’s saying. _Not the one in control, not the one alerting them to the bigger situation._ “You have responsibilities-“ (None of which you are following.)

To him, saving lives is above following orders. 

If ignoring orders means he can save a few lives, then he’ll gladly do it again. Besides, his little intervention wasn’t what cost the battle, more of a lack of backup. He’s pretty sure Pidge is fully aware that this cannot be blamed entirely on him, but they don't look the least bit bothered. 

Lance isn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. 

He could do both, really. 

Allura’s words are taking on an edge now, sharper and brighter and designed to burrow up under his skin and make him skittish. 

“What in the_ quiznaking _fourth realm _was_ that?” 

If she wasn’t so mad and he had enough energy, he’d spring right back up with a suitable quip. But she’s mad and he’s tired- no, absolutely exhausted- and he really can’t. So he pulls up his little shield of white noise and lets the argument fly right over his head. 

What on Earth had he been trying to pull? 

A very hasty rescue from the ground.

What went wrong?

Everything- except for the bit where one of the children handed him a tiny little beach-shell thing in return for the return of his sister and parents (“-thank y-you so much! I-I know this isn’t m-much, but would y-you take this-”), and the absolute relief he’d felt when he’d reunited other children with their families. 

His little ‘detour’ with Blue threw a hole into the tight defence of the lions up in the sky, so the Galra in their infuriating little jets shot right through and took advantage. Hunk and Shiro took the the brunt of that attack while the castle was almost bowled over with its particle shield half-flickering out of existence. Keith and Pidge, while away from the centre of the attack, still were overtaken by the bigger fighter fleet- they all took heavy damage. 

It had been alright before Lance saw the group of struggling humanoid aliens on the ground with a group of Galrans closing in on them with blasters. The worst case scenario hit his mind like a hot iron and left such a horrible blistered burn that he didn’t think twice and shot straight for them. 

He forgot he and Blue were part of the frontline for once, a way for Allura and Shiro to decide if he was up to such an important job because he’s practically blown up on them previously about it, that they weren’t taking him seriously enough and- and then he’d forgotten it. 

Messed up it like he’d messed up everything in his miserable little life. 

The realisation must have struck him harder then he expected because his familiar white noise shield broke apart and he finally heard the steady beat of words. 

“How-” Allura shudders like it’s hurting her physically. “How many more fights will you cost us? How many more mistakes will you make? How many _lives will you end_?”

He flinches at the same time she winces. Keith opens his mouth with some desperation in his eyes.

Surely she didn’t mean it literally- she probably meant it as ‘_how many lives will end because of your inability to follow instructions?’_

Incorrect. (How stupid can you be?)

The princess doesn’t follow up her wrong words with an apology. It’s a clear indication that while she knows she phrased it too quickly and too bluntly, she really does mean it. Looking around, he can tell that everyone agrees, though slightly hesitatingly. Everyone but Keith.

The Red Paladin looks uncertain and unwillingly to just accept her words. Lance can see he’s about to say something, so he focuses in on his direction. Allura notices and glances back at Keith and he snaps his mouth shut abruptly. That was it.

A bystander. 

Pidge stares at the wall like there’s never been anything more fascinating. Hunk is silent. Shiro is- Shiro’s left the room. Coran is presumably in the medical faculty. 

Lance turns on his heels and leaves, feeling whatever relief remained in his chest pile up into sticky gloop that wrap around his ribs too tightly. 

If they have no qualms about shoving him aside like that without listening to his side of the story- if they can listen to everyone but chose to ignore him and shut him down, if they don’t care about him, then he can just leave. 

Simple. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so that's the first chapter completely utterly rewritten. have you noticed that lance is very, very different to the previous version? hahaha i'm really fricking unable to keep a published chapter published and untouched because i wake up one day and realsie that i must rewrite it because it's trash. now if only i could do that to my life. 
> 
> hmm so for the first part, any dialogue is in spanish. i didn't translate anything because google translate is really, REALLY unreliable lol. lance's twin is there for the sake of the plot (and i wanted some whump when people realise that space wasn't really his dream) and well, lancey boi is smarter then you give him credit. ^^
> 
> so uh, i've taken down the other chapters to rewrite and lengthen out and i'll probably add one more or two :P


	2. memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hnn spare!

space- 


	3. enemies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "-some remnant of the enemies we make ourselves, we call our souls."
> 
> sparrreee.

space- your enemy 


	4. hope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "- can we blink back ourselves to back then? To when we were young and naive?"

space- your enemy that you don't know exists until


	5. indicturus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "-perhaps you shouldn't make that choice."
> 
> spareee

space- your enemy that you don't know exists until you go out and discover what it really means to be lost.

**Author's Note:**

> *note: sorry if i offend anyone, but-
> 
> I know I update incredibly slowly and don't have an update schedule of any kind, but i'd really like it if people stopped asking me to update because that only makes me lose motivation ^^" I'm writing this for fun (and maybe to vent a little). i love that people are actually reading this and enjoying it, but... this is being written for my own enjoyment. so if y'all keep doing that, writing this fic is going to turn into a chore and I really don't want that to happen cause I have so many plans ^^" So please, try not to do that ^^


End file.
